War of the Worlds (Barnes & Noble Classics Series)

Remember

What many of these reviewers are forgetting is that this book is a science fiction piece. To say that this novel lacked facts or reality is exactly what fiction is about. If this book were in fact based on actual events, I highly doubt we would be able to even speak of it at this point. When reviewing this novel, people should keep in mind that this book is supposed to get that part of the brain going that excites us and makes us want more. Sci-fi writers such as Wells and Bradbury want two things out of reading their stories: they want you to be astounded and most importantly they want you to think. As an avid reader of this genre, I have to say that there is always a deeper meaning than what the story is about. There is a lesson and there is also a meaning. Take these points into consideration before reviewing this novel and trying to slander the well put together writings of H.G. Wells.

7 out of 7 people found this review helpful.

For the science fiction readers

This book turned out to be much different than I expected. When I saw the title, The War of the Worlds I thought oh cool, aliens and humans having an epic battle on some distant planet. It also sounded like the setting was going to take place sometime in the future. Both of these primary assumptions turned out to be very wrong. The battle was very down to earth, literally, and it took place at a time period before the present, and the battle was not very epic at all. The Martians, who come by way of some sort of gun that shoots them in pod sort of things from mars to earth, can barely even walk on earth due to the higher gravity. Then when the Martians get situated and start building their monstrous walking machines the humans are completely clueless and come to watch them like it is some kind of circus. When the Martians finally get the walking machine working there is a large crowd watching and the party ends abruptly when the Martians pull out the heat ray and people, buildings, and everything else goes up in flames. I think this book would have been more interesting if the humans hadn't been so helpless, if they had actually put up a good fight. The only good weapon the human race had were cannons, which were not all that effective because the people who were supposed to be firing them were dying to fast. To sum it all up, the humans were being dominated by the Martians. This was kind of frustrating for me while I read because it seemed like the only thing that the main character of the book was doing was running away and hiding, in fact that's all any of the people in the book seemed to be doing. While H.G. Wells is an excellent writer, for me this wasn't a book I was just dying to get back to the moment I set it down. This book is not at all a fun easy read. It is in fact a fairly challenging book to understand. This book is written with a sort of English voice to it that makes it even harder because I am not familiar with the England-English vernacular. This book is also very descriptive which at times is a good thing but sometimes it just made me even more lost. The ending was another thing that frustrated me. While it did come to a clear and concise ending which I usually like, it didn't really end in a way that seemed possible or realistic at all. It did explain itself in the end but who wants to read a story about a battle that is just getting to its climax when one of the fighting sides stops fighting all at once because they all died as a result of some unseen force. In the battle of this book no one side actually wins. One side just loses. Overall this book was ok. The story line was good, and the story moved smoothly from on idea to the next it just wasn't super interesting.

4 out of 4 people found this review helpful.

The War of the Worlds- A Great Read

This book is a work of art. The descriptions of the Martians and the battle for survival of the human created by H.G. Wells is exciting and worth reading. The narrator's journey to reeunite with his wife in the mist of the Martians arrival on Earth is extremely interesting to read. Also, the Martians themselves are new and different than anything that most have heard, or read, of before. The only downside of this wonderful novel is the author of the endnotes. He gives away the ending of the book in the first few endnotes, and I would've rather found out for myself the ending at the end of the book. Other than that, it is a must-read for any sci-fi fan.

3 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

Aliens Invade Britain

I thought this book was fantastic! It really engaged me and was suspenseful. It takes place in England, where an alien invasion from Mars begins. It is seen through the eyes of a man who is escaping from the invasion's spread. I liked this book a lot and highly recommend it to anyone who likes science fiction.

3 out of 4 people found this review helpful.

The War of The Worlds

The War of The Worlds is set in a lot of different cities. All of the cities are located around London, where the story takes place. It all starts when they see huge bursts of flames coming from Mars. They just think the bursts are huge volcanoes. These bursts went on for 10 nights, 1 for each night.

Wells, who is the main character, is observing these bursts with his friend Ogilvy. Ogilvy sees a shooting star one night and checks it out. The star lands on a common, between Horsell, Chobham, and Woking. When he gets to it, it is a huge cylinder. The whole town knows after London publishes articles of it in the newspaper.

While all these people are crowded around it working on it they hear sounds. The workers are trying to open it to see what's inside. They hear it moving and the lid comes flying off. They see this creature come out then this huge antenna. The antenna turns out to be a heat ray and kills so many people.

When they discover the Martians are bad, they try to escape. Wells sends his wife to his cousin for protection. Wells goes through all these different cities being followed by fighting machines. At one point he is almost captured. Then he escapes his hiding place without being seen.

He goes through Regents Park trying to avoid a fighting machine. Wells finds an armed man in the swamp. It was the artilleryman he met when it all started. They went and had a feast after they got out of the swamp. Once they got done eating Wells left.

Wells makes it all the way home. He searches through his house to see what damage was done. The only thing messed up was his front door. When he opens his French doors to go outside his wife is out there waiting for him. They are back together and try to forget about the Martians.

2 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

A book for everyone

This book is so amazing! I think everybody should read this at least once in their lifetime!

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Very good book.

Best book ever

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

Amazing

This is a true sci-fi classic. I read this in English class, and thoroughly loved it. It is about how aliens come to Earth because their planet of Mars is dying, and how the narrator experiences it, being a scientist himself. The main theme is that humanity considers itself the most intellectual creatures in the universe, but it may not be. There is symbolism throughout the book, but it is not nessessary to understand the symbols to enjoy the novel. Read carefully, though, because some parts can become rather confusing if you merely skim over it. It served as an inspiration to many future novels, plays, and movies. There is the originial radio broadcast (which served a lot of panic, you can look it up on wiki), a play, and two movies (one of which has Tom Cruise in it =>)

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

The War of the Worlds

The name of the book I¿m reviewing is War of the Worlds. It was written by H. G. Wells. This book was published by the Dalmatian Press in 2005. It was published in Franklin, Tennessee, U.S.A. The books genre is science-fiction. It has 248 pages, 244 of which are the actual story. War of the Worlds is about Martians that land on Earth and begin to kill humans wreak havoc. The story is told in first person. War of the Worlds takes place in the late century 1800's in England. The story takes place in and around numerous cities and towns. Some of these cities include London, Ottershaw, and Woking. The book doesn¿t say the name of the main character in the story, but he is an astronomer and look at the stars a lot. Other important characters in the story are Ogilvy. The plot in the story is that Martians come to Earth from Mars and bring with them weapons that far exceeded any weapon on Earth. I like War of the Worlds because it helps to show how life was like back when it was written. I also like the vocabulary that is used in the book. I enjoyed reading War of the Worlds. It is one of the science-fiction books that I find entertaining. I like the writing style that H. G. Wells used when he wrote the book. It gives me a feeling of what it was like to live back then. The ¿voice¿ of the narrator makes him sound intelligent because of the large vocabulary that is being used to tell the story. When I read War of the Worlds, it reminds me that sometimes things happen that you can¿t do anything about. In the story, the Martians had weapons that were superior to any weapon on Earth. If you are a person who likes to read science-fiction books, or any other type of book for that matter, I would recommend reading War of the Worlds.

1 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

BORING!

I am a big scifi ,and fantasy fan but this was not very good at all H.G.Wells did not do a good job it is incredably boring, and a waste of time. I could not even finish this book.

1 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Alex edge book review

War of the worlds,first off was divided into two books. The first book was full of action and war. The second book was slow and boring. Finally it was only about 380 of the 434 pages. Thnk you for listening.

We share this planet with them

They are already here living on earth with us
We barely notice them because they are well hidden and very stealthy
They probably won't destroy us like in this book, but they certainly could
I think H G Wells was right about there being from a dying planet Mars
They may have been here all along and we just didn't pay attention to them
Probably came from Mars though
We are safe until we bother them
They have colonies under the oceans and large bases or submerged motherships in Bermuda Triangle and Dragon's Triangle
They probably use earth's magnetic field for power source
I hope they make peaceful first contact soon

ABSOLUTELY LOVED IT!

I'm not going to lie because at first this book proved to be a little bit difficult to read to someone here where English does not come as a 1st language even though I speak it fluently and practically with no accent. Thinking like a British writer from the late 1800's is entirely different in the matters of trying to understand the story. But as time went on and I kept reading the book I began to see the full picture. Even though this was not a light book to read I was hooked and captivated by the story and all of the action in it. The ending turns out to be a happy one, a real true story of the picture that we get of life starting over again in so many ways. However I would have really loved to know more about this red weed that Well's talks about and exactly how the Martians died.

To anyone

I belive in ghosts because of the haunted north caralina book.ps you cant find it on your nook

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

I believe

I mean....... there is so much territorry that we have never even seen! Humans have only explored about 10% of the whole ocean! And aliens?! We have never been father than the moon personally!

0 out of 3 people found this review helpful.

To anyone

Do you belive?

0 out of 1 people found this review helpful.

a classic..

well written, love the characters (not too involved) and i love the story. no time wasted here. and concerning the actual copy of the book, after a few pages you get used to the differences. its obviously the title and page number jumbled in with the story, but for free its truly look-overable :)

To anyone

I do belive in the jersey devil and stuff do u i just think thre real

Anyone..

If u believe in bigfoot or the loch ness monster. Post what u believe and why

0 out of 2 people found this review helpful.

Transcription quality

The story was great. The text is messed up from the transcription process (misspellings, characters in place of letters, and other distracting mistakes), which makes it a little difficult to read at times.